Archive for July 14, 2010

After the World Cup , I learned quite a lot about the intensity with which the Hispanic consumer relates to sports and media. As Americans have accepted more Latin stars into the world of American sports (Tony Romo, Pau Gasol, Albert Pujols, etc), the Latino consumer has been following a parallel trend: identifying more closely with sports like football, basketball, and autoracing. Nevertheless, Latinos also continue to follow more “Latino” sports like soccer, baseball and boxing.

It’s been shown that Hispanics spend more time online, but the more important question is, where do Latinos access sports info online? We might initially think of one Latino online universe, the same 4 or 5 pages that we’ve used and that seem to be the safest path to reaching Latinos (ESPNDeportes, etc). However, if we look a bit deeper, we can see that the Latino consumer searches out other sites: he’s exploring a larger online universe, surfing pages from his country of origin, looking at pages from the country of origin of his favorite ballplayers, looking for sites that provide more information, as well as better quality in terms of content and production value. He may visit sites like USA Deporte or El Quinto Cuarto. Digital marketing professionals can now optimize their online efforts at better price and with a better reach. to relevant Hispanic consumers.

It’s over. Spain won. In some ways, so did South Africa, but that is a different story for a different day. Soccer won all the way around. Arguably, this World Cup was the most important of all that preceded it. It was a milestone. It was, as most large sporting events often are, a milestone in international branding and advertising. The final tally is impossible to factor, but suffice it to say that thousands of companies spent hundreds of millions of dollars over the past year in some way hitching their company to the World Cup star. But like I said, now it is over.

So if you are one of those companies, congratulations! You recognized and took advantage of leveraging the power and value of the biggest sporting event in modern times. The question is, what is your next step? What is your plan going forward? Is it part of a long-term strategy or did you put everything on the ball and didn’t look past the final whistle? If you did, then you probably already know about the vacuum that can be created immediately after such a monumental event. The sparkle is gone and a hole is often created. There is no longer any forward momentum. In sporting parlance, “that is not a winning strategy.”

Good coaches and superior teams know the power and value of one thing above all else— consistency and practice win games. Winning enough games creates championship teams. Creating enough championship teams establishes legends. The same is true with marketing a company or growing a brand. So when is your next practice? What does your strategy look like? Does it include an immediate follow up or are you going to wait another four years for the next World Cup? (I can wager that the Dutch team will not- they are probably talking strategy today).